< Back to front page Text size – +

If you see these guys hanging around, call the state

E-mail|Link|Comments () August 8, 2009 07:30 PM

Ed Collier for The Boston Globe

A researcher checking a litle brown bat at Moore State Park in Paxton last year.

By Globe Staff

Got bats in your belfry? Report them to the state.

The state Division of Fisheries and Wildlife recently asked residents around the state to report bat colonies in their attics or in barns, abandoned houses, church steeples, or other locations where they're hanging around so biologists can study white-nose syndrome, the fungal disease that is causing mass bat deaths in northeastern and Atlantic states.

The officials are asking for people to report colonies of 10 bats or more. The agency says that monitoring the summer roosts will give biologists data on how bat populations are faring. Residents who have bats should call 508-389-6300 or e-mail mass.wildlife@state.ma.us.

Bats are disappearing in the Northeast, the Globe reported in October, with a baffling illness wiping out more than 75 percent of bat populations in the abandoned mines and ice-encased caves where they hibernate.

But researchers think that they are closing in on a cause: a cold-loving soil fungus that seems to thrive on several species of hibernating bats during the winter months. The white fungus is so noticeable on the bats, researchers last year dubbed the sickness white-nose syndrome.